Stay with Me (Wait for You, #3)(7)

“Damnit.” I turned, dipping my chin as I wiggled my toes back into the shoe.

“You look like you could use a drink.”

I twisted toward the sound of a surprisingly deep male voice, a voice so deep and smooth, it rolled over my skin like I’d been draped in satin. I started to point out that, duh, since I was standing in a bar, I probably did look like I needed a drink, but the snappy words died on my tongue as I faced the horseshoe-shaped bar.

At first, the guy behind the bar seemed to have straightened, as if he was drawing back. It was a strange reaction. In this low lighting and the way I was standing, there was no way he saw the scar, but then I got a real good look at him, and I wasn’t paying attention to that anymore.

Oh my, my, my . . .

There was a man behind the bar, the kind of guy I would not ever in the history of ever expect to see behind Mona’s bar.

Whoa, hot-bartender alert to the max.

Goodness, he was gorgeous, stunning in the way Jase Winstead was, maybe even more so, because I couldn’t quite remember seeing someone who looked as good as he did in real life, and I was only seeing Hot Bartender Dude from the waist up.

He had brown hair that looked like a rich, warm color under the brighter lights of the bar area. It was cut close to the skull on the sides and a little longer on the top. Wavy, it was styled back off his forehead in an artfully messy look, showing off his broad and high cheekbones. His skin was tan, hinting at some kind of foreign and exotic ancestry. With a strong and sculpted jaw that could cut rock, he could be the poster boy for shaving ads. Under a straight nose that had a slight hook in it were the fullest, most downright sinful, pair of lips I’d ever seen on a guy.

Good lawd, I could stare at those lips for hours, like way beyond the acceptable time limit and right into creeperville, population Calla. I forced my gaze back up.

His brows appeared to be naturally arched over the corners of his eyes, which drew the attention right to his eyes.

Brown eyes.

Brown eyes that were currently slowly and casually drifting over me in a way that felt like a warm caress. My lips parted on an inhale.

He was wearing a worn gray shirt that clung to broad shoulders and an unbelievably defined chest. I mean, I could actually see the cut of his chest through the shirt. Holy crap, who knew that was even possible? From what I could see down to where the bar top cut him off was an equally hard, and probably equally dazzling, stomach.

If this dude went to Shepherd, he would’ve dethroned Jase for lieutenant of the Hot Guy Brigade. And the sigh associated with Hot Bartender Dude would most definitely be felt around the world and in the lady parts.

Probably in some boy parts, too.

Those delicious lips curved up on one side. Yep, he even had a panty-dropping hot smile. “You okay, honey?”

He used the term honey like it was natural to him. Not cheesy or slimy, but a sexy endearment that had my belly warming.

And I was staring at him like an idiot.

“Yeah.” I found my voice to say one word, and it had croaked out of me. God, I wanted to body-slam myself through the floor as heat zinged across my cheeks.

That sexy half grin tipped up a notch as he extended an arm, curling his fingers back toward him. “Why don’t you come over here and have a seat?”

Okay.

My feet moved forward without any brain involvement because, seriously, who didn’t respond when Hot Bartender Dude wiggled long fingers at you like that? I found my butt planted in a bar stool with a ripped and slightly uncomfortable cushion.

Dear God in Heaven, up close like this, he was truly a masculine masterpiece of mouthwatering hotness.

That half grin didn’t fade as he placed his palms on the edge of the bar top. “What’s your poison?”

I blinked at him, real slow like, and all I could think about was why in the hell was he working in this dump? He could be in magazines, or on the TV, or at least working at the steak house down the street.

Hot Bartender Dude tilted his head to the side as his grin spread to the other corner of that freaking mouth. “Honey . . . ?”

I resisted the urge to plop my elbows on the bar top and stare up at him, even though I was already halfway to doing that. “Yes?”

He chuckled softly as he leaned in, and I mean, waaay in. Within a second, he was all up in my personal space, his mouth mere inches from mine, and his biceps flexed, stretching the worn material of his shirt.

Oh my golly gee, I hoped his shirt just ripped up the sides and fell right off.

“What would you like to drink?” he asked.

What I would like was to watch his mouth move some more. “Um . . .” My brain emptied.

He arched a brow as his gaze tracked from my mouth to my eyes. “Do I need to card you?”

That snapped me out of my hot-inducing stupor. “No. Not at all. I’m twenty-one.”

“You sure?”

Heat infused my face again. “I swear.”

“Pinky swear?”

My gaze dipped to his now-extended hand and to his pinky. “Seriously?”

A dimple started to form in his right cheek as his grin turned into a smile. Holy crapola, if he had a set of dimples, I was so in trouble. “Do I look like I’m not serious?”

He looked like he was up to absolutely no good as I stared at him. There was a downright mischievous glimmer to his warm, cocoa eyes. My lips started to twitch, and then I reached up and wrapped my pinky around his much larger one.